Eric Stevenson It's weird how the animated movies based on DC comics are usually more adult than the actual ones made more for adults. I will admit that this movie has some flaws. I was annoyed by the fact that it showed Hal Jordan become the Green Lantern in literally the first five minutes! I just think the pacing could have been done better. I also don't like it how Boodikka was a villain out of seemingly nowhere. Still, I don't even know much about her from the comics so I guess I can't really judge. I'm not that familiar with the Green Lantern. I know a fair amount about him from the "Justice League" cartoon again.What's great is that the animation is nice. We also get to see so many Green Lanterns come together and contribute. This is probably the main flaw with the live-action "Green Lantern" movie. We got all this buildup to them working together but in the end it's just Hal Jordan who does all of the work. Okay, he technically does most of the work here, but we get a much better origin story with Sinestro featured as the villain. We get to see the other characters like the Guardians of the Universe partake in the story and it even takes a lot of risks with many characters flat out dying. While not as good as "Wonder Woman" a fine flick. ***

MasterFantastic A very solid effort from the writers and animators at DC. The origin of GL, Hal Jordan, is solidly told, if a little quickly and predictably. We have the dying alien, Abin Suhr, giving his ring to someone worthy, ace pilot Hal, a decent guy doing a hard job and trying to have fun with it.And fun he has! Hal takes to the ring like a duckling takes to water, and soon he is flying high with the other Green Lanterns, getting into trouble on alien worlds, and saving the day.The pluses of the movie are many. The animation is smooth, and green never looked so good. The voices are excellent. Christopher Meloni excels as Hal, and Victor Garber is suavely evil as Sinestro. All the other voice roles are handled well; in fact, there are no slackers in the bunch.The music is also excellent, providing drama when necessary, being playful and light at others. As always, the alien worlds were depicted imaginatively. Watching this movie might have been somewhat predictable, but it was a fun ride all the way.Its only drawback was that Hal took to his power ring too quickly. No practice, no failures in forming constructs...nada. A little exposition might have made the screenplay work better, but all the same, it was enjoyable, and the ending fight between Hal and Sinestro was superbly staged. A worthy addition to any fan's animated collection.

Helio Copter After watching this, I find myself once again lamenting the 2011 live-action Green Lantern film. This animated film, FIRST FLIGHT, is far superior in storytelling and frankly, entertainment value as well. To me, this is one of the better of the Warner/DC animated features.The thing is, from what I understand (not having read any of the comics) Green Lantern is a "space cop." What this film does right is that it focuses on those two things: being a cop...in space. The segment where Hal is out "on the beat" with Sinestro is a great, and other segments further work investigation and innocent/guilty questions into the plot line. Whereas the live-action film spent most of its duration on Earth, FIRST FLIGHT spends only about the first five minutes. Granted, a little more time could have helped to established who Hal is as a character beyond that he's a pilot. But that is forgivable, because time spent out elsewhere in the universe is much more exciting and makes more sense in the context of this telling of the origin-story.I was very impressed by the writing for Sinestro character. What he says and does is genuinely thought-provoking. The voice acting was just fine; I didn't hardly find myself thinking about it, and that is the way it should be. Some of the CGI effects were pretty cheap looking, but for the most part the animation was clean and fluid.Overall, FIRST FLIGHT was very entertaining, with an intelligent script, some plot twists and lots of action. The PG-13 rating is for some language and some fairly graphic animated violence. It strikes me as very strange that this direct-to-DVD production would be in almost every way superior to a huge-budget theatrical live-action film. Why couldn't they all be as good as FIRST FLIGHT? Sigh.

implaxible I haven't read the GL comics for several years, mostly since they switched Hal Jordan for the new guy(s). However, most of the characters are familiar in this movie and I don't feel I missed a thing (except a giant boxing glove!) It was nice to see GL up on the "big" screen for a change -- this could certainly be done live-action nowadays. However, it seems like a pilot for a TV series (like Clone Wars was).I thought I saw a few references to old sci-fi icons in this one -- Cooch looked like that cucumber alien from It Conquered the World, and I think the spaceship the GLs ferried Hal Jordan to Oa the first time resembled the Phantom Cruiser from Space Ghost.I would have liked to see more of the actual weakness of the green ring to yellow, perhaps having it fizzle out somehow when it contacted that color. However, it seemed to have no weakness at all, even to the point of being able to damage the Yellow Lantern (albeit cleverly). Even if it was explained it was only affecting the black parts, it would have made sense.